Roast & Rise

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The Business Model Memo: What AI Changes About What You Sell

Redraw your business model for an AI-shaped market.

You map which parts of your offer are now commodity-priced with AI and which deserve a human premium. In the end, you write a focused one-page memo committing to the bet that will define your market position for the next 12–24 months.

A cinematic editorial still-life of a clean, modern desk in warm light. On the desk: a small neat stack of blank, slightly textured memo sheets sits at the epicenter of radiating, separated offer cards. Each card varies subtly in material—some crisp, some matte, some translucent—conveying 'old' and 'new' value. The light falls most strongly on a single memo page at the center, suggesting centrality of strategic judgement. Generous negative space, no visible text, no people, no screens. Palette: rich orange accents (edges, hints of burnt on-paper), creamy white, and warm neutrals. No visible logos, dashboards, or branded artifacts.
Every business leader now faces the split: what AI makes abundant, and what only human judgement defends as premium. This visual introduces the cinematic editorial world of the business model memo.

Course thesis

AI erases old lines between value and commodity. The real strategic work now is identifying which parts of your offer AI makes cheap and everywhere, and which parts—judgement, trust, and leadership—become the scarce, premium-priced domain. Most businesses miss this turn. This is the memo you write when you want to bet on the future.

What you leave with

By the end, you will see where AI shifts your market power, create a map of premium and commodity activities, and commit your next move in one clear business model memo.

For

Founders, executives, and board members who want to rethink their business model in light of AI's impact on value, pricing, and the human premium.

Workflow

Diagnosing core offers, mapping the human premium vs. AI-commoditized services, making strategic pricing and offer decisions, and synthesizing these insights into a decisive business model memo.

Change

Moves from assuming AI only impacts internal operations, to actively mapping and redefining what makes the offer valuable and committing to a new, explicit business model bet.

What you can do

Use these as checks while you move through the plan.

Spot exactly where AI commoditizes your company's offer and where human skill remains scarce.

Map your portfolio against the new premium/commodity line.

Recognize work that still commands a premium: trust, judgement, and leadership.

Draft a one-page, bet-the-company memo capturing your response for the next 12–24 months.

Identify early warning metrics to track whether your bet is working or needs to shift.

Chapters

01

Expose the New Value Line

Inventory every offer, feature, and service to reveal what AI may soon commoditize—and what remains premium. Build the starting list for a strategic business model shift.

A warm-lit, editorial desktop scene. An open archival folder spills out layers of labelled and unlabeled index cards and translucent sheets. Some cards are sharply focused, others half-hidden beneath layers, illustrating explicit versus hidden offers. Some sheets are clearly marked as different material—vellum, card, paper—without text. Ornate desk lamp outside direct view spills light, emphasizing the reveal of hidden streams. No people, no devices, no visible text, screens, or branding.
Revealing the new value line requires an unfiltered, forensic inventory of every offer, service, and behind-the-scenes touchpoint—seen and unseen.

Why this matters in the workflow

It’s tempting to leap from AI headlines straight to sweeping strategy. But there’s no business model pivot until you know exactly what your company sells, piece by piece. This is the first honest cut: a ground-level map, not of what you say you sell but of what truly leaves your hands for the market, billable or bundled. Only then can you see where AI draws a hard new line between commodity and premium.

The working model

Your offer is more than customer-facing product sheets. It’s every distinct value flow: core services, add-ons, white-glove touches, bundled expertise, advisory minute, even the ‘hidden’ effort nobody calls out but clients expect. AI’s wave doesn’t sweep in at product-level—it runs right through the atoms of what you do for people.

Quality checklist

Every offer and value stream—overt or hidden—is listed.

Lines are specific, concrete (not vague rollups).

Frequency and revenue share estimates are included.

At least one scenario or client use per major offer.

Sheet is review-ready for the next AI mapping step.

Common mistakes

Missing the invisible, behind-the-scenes, or ‘free’ services.

Lumping multiple offers together under a broad category.

Skipping frequency, revenue, or trend columns.

Ignoring team input (your blind spots are their daily work).

Checkpoint

Is your offer inventory complete, concrete, and detailed enough that an outsider can see streams you take for granted? Move on only if every value stream is named.

Exercise

Build Your Full Offer Inventory

Goal: Surface every value stream and offer your company puts into the world, ready for honest AI scrutiny.

Steps:

  1. Open the Offer Inventory Worksheet template below (spreadsheet, doc, or whiteboard).
  2. List every current product, service, and bundled feature you offer. Use recent invoices, contracts, and team memory to jog details.
  3. For each line, add these columns:
  • Explicit offer or hidden/value-add?
  • Frequency (every client, some, rare)
  • Revenue % (estimate)
  • Is this growing, steady, declining?
  • Short client example or scenario.
  1. Challenge yourself: Add anything you ‘give away’—those little extras clients expect but never see itemized.
  2. Save or photograph your sheet. You’ll use it for mapping AI impact in the next step.

Output: A concrete, honest inventory ready for mapping.

Time required: You can finish a version of this in 15 minutes, and refine it with your team within a day.

Use this at work tomorrow

Inventory your full offer list, including every hidden or ‘free’ value stream. This is your map for the shifts AI brings.

02

Map Commodity and Premium Zones

Classify every element of your offer as AI-commodity, Human Premium, or Up for Grabs—so you know where to double down, reprice, or let go.

Editorial tabletop with a minimal, horizontal threshold or dividing line (metallic or inlaid wood) bisecting the visual field. On one side, a spread of uniform, stacked offer cards (implied commodity) in matte material. On the far side of the line, a small group of cards stands alone, raised, or in richer, glossier material (premium). A few cards hover in-between, showing ambiguity. Warm light draws the eye across the threshold. Palette: orange and off-white, strong shadow for zone contrast. No text, numbers, or people.
A sharp, cinematic diagram: each offer is confronted with a threshold. Only what earns human premium crosses into the rare zone.

Why this matters in the workflow

Surface optimism and panic. Then get real. Business model shifts demand evidence, not guesswork. This chapter moves you from broad AI speculation—“will we be disrupted?”—to a grounded map: what you sell, and how much of it still commands a premium.

The world is splitting. Anything AI can deliver at scale (fast, everywhere, for almost nothing) will become cheap, then expected, then invisible. Human judgement, trust, and leadership grow more valuable with each wave of automation. PwC's 2026 Jobs Barometer shows premium pricing follows trust—where clients feel only a person, not a machine, can bridge the gap.

Classifying your offers now isn’t academic. It sets the stage for repricing, repositioning, or ceasing activities AI is swallowing. It frees attention for what will actually pay—where you, or someone like you, are the only bet that matters.

Quality checklist

Every current offer/component placed in a zone—nothing unexamined.

Each placement has a supporting rationale—evidence, client data, or clear hypothesis.

No clusters of 'Up for Grabs' without a plan to clarify soon.

Output is ready for peer review—would another executive understand your logic?

Language is clear, not defensive: the map is honest about risk and potential.

Common mistakes

Leaving entire services unclassified because of discomfort.

Lumping offers together by function, not client impact.

Writing rationales that are just opinions, not backed by real signals.

Failing to revisit the 'Up for Grabs' items soon enough.

Letting hope override evidence in Human Premium calls.

Checkpoint

Can you show your completed commodity vs. premium map—with everything placed and rationales clear—to a peer or board member, and defend each choice?

Exercise

Build Your Commodity vs. Premium Map (15 min)

  1. Open your full offer inventory (from the last chapter).
  2. For each offer or component, decide: AI-commodity? Human Premium? Up for Grabs?
  3. Record why you made each classification (client quote, price evidence, RFP, your own recent buyer-side experience).
  4. Use the template below to structure your map.
  5. Review: Is anything left unplaced? Push for clarity and test your rationales—would a skeptical peer believe your logic?

Use this at work tomorrow

Open your actual offer list, force every item into one of the three zones, and write one sentence of real-world evidence for each. Get a second opinion within days.

03

Test for the Unseen Premium

Move beyond assumptions. Find real evidence of where human-centric value holds or grows, and test how reframing services around judgement, trust, or leadership can command premium pricing—even as AI becomes the baseline.

A warm, cinematic still-life: multiple summary cards (no text) are arrayed side-by-side on a review board or heavy paper surface. Each card is attached with a distinctive marker—pin, clip, wax seal—emphasizing authentication. Some cards carry attached evidence artifacts (envelopes, ticket, translucent sheets). A strong, narrow beam of light reveals only a few, suggesting selective, real proof. Palette is warm off-white with burnt orange accents. No people, screens, or writing.
Premium is proven in the field. Evidence for human value is assembled, compared, and scrutinized in the light.

Why this matters in the workflow

AI is flattening the price of anything it can do cheaply or everywhere. That means your old value pitch—speed, accuracy, volume, even beauty—might not be a premium play any more. But research (PwC 2026 AI Jobs Barometer, others) says the real premium lives in judgement, trust, leadership. If you don’t test for these now, you’ll miss where your true value still grows and end up competing in the commodity pool.

The working model

  • Commodity zones: Anything the market now expects AI can deliver for next to nothing.
  • Premium zones: Offers or experiences requiring human judgement, relationship, trust, nuanced synthesis, or the authority to make or stand behind a call.

Often, these premium zones aren’t obvious. Clients may buy a deliverable, but stay for peace of mind. Or they pay the most for decisiveness under pressure, when AI can only suggest.

Quality checklist

Includes at least one won and one lost/at-risk deal, with real details.

Distinguishes outputs (what was delivered) from outcomes (what proved valuable).

Uses actual or paraphrased client language where possible.

Explicitly tests reframing the deal as a premium human offer—not just a product.

Finishes with a summary: where could or did a human premium actually hold or strengthen?

Common mistakes

Assuming all client interest is due to human input when price or convenience drove the deal.

Projecting hypothetical value without backing it up with real client comments or actions.

Failing to distinguish between the product delivered and the deeper value (decision support, trust, leadership).

Making the analysis generic, not offer-specific.

Repeating company sales stories without fresh client language.

Checkpoint

Can you show—using real deal evidence—where your clients have paid for, or been willing to pay for, judgement, trust, or leadership above what AI can deliver?

Exercise

Surface Your Premium Proofs: Case Comparison Worksheet

Goal: Identify one service or deliverable where human judgement, trust, or leadership made the difference.

  1. Pick one recently won deal and one recently lost or threatened deal (e.g., client left for a cheaper or AI-driven alternative).
  2. For each:
  • What was the offer or deliverable?
  • What did the client say about why they chose (or left) you?
  • Was any part of the price or experience linked to access to a human, trust in your judgement, or your decision-making?
  • Did you frame or price it that way—explicitly—or was it just assumed?
  • If you re-pitched the same deal today as a premium service centered on human-led value (judgement, trust, or leadership), how would you describe it?
  1. Compare: Where did the human premium hold or grow? Where did it evaporate under AI pressure?
  2. Write a short summary: Where is your hidden premium power?

Complete this for both deals. Use real client language wherever possible. Timebox: 15 minutes.

Use this at work tomorrow

Interview one recent client and ask them directly: what would have made this worth paying more—speed, certainty, or leadership? Update your premium offer framing based on their language.

04

Draft Your Business Model Memo

Synthesize your commodity/premium map and premium potential work into a sharp, one-page business model memo. Commit your bet for the board, team, and the market.

Editorial desk surface with a sharp, single memo page centered, flanked by stacked offer cards and evidence tokens (clips, stamps, embossed seals). The memo sheet is prominent, well-lit, and overlies fragments of other documents, showing it is a synthesis. Pale orange highlight (ribbon, corner, or wax) denotes focus and finality. No visible handwriting, numbers, or brand marks. The whole desk is uncluttered, cinematic, serious.
All evidence converges in a single, composed business model memo—short, sharp, and ready for a decision table.

Why this matters in the workflow

Diagnosing what AI changes is pointless unless you can prove you’ll act. A good business model memo turns mapping into commitment. It moves the work from insight to action: deciding what you’ll sell, at what price, and what you’ll kill or protect. This is your declaration—to the board, to the team, and to the market—of what you truly believe AI changes for your business in the next 12–24 months.

The working model

The memo is short. One page. Every line earned. It does three things:

  1. Names the single biggest bet you’re making, not a palette of options.
  2. States which offers, features, or services will be commodity-priced (AI-automated, undifferentiated, or dropped), and which will justify a premium (judgement, trust, leadership).
  3. Sets explicit next steps—what will be doubled down on, what will be sunset, and how success or failure will be measured.

Quality checklist

Is the memo sharp: one page, no fluff or fill?

Does it state a single, clear bet—not multiple hedges?

Is every claim supported by evidence or market/client signals?

Are hard trade-offs named (what you will stop, kill, or sunset)?

Are next steps and learning metrics explicit and actionable?

Has it been shared and reviewed by a senior decision-maker?

Common mistakes

Writing a generic position that could apply to any company or industry.

Claiming uniqueness or premium without client/market proof.

Failing to commit to hard choices (old offers just "renamed").

Trying to cover more than one direction (multiple bets).

Ignoring the review/feedback step from stakeholders.

Creeping over one page—memo loses focus and power.

Checkpoint

Did you write a one-page memo with a clear AI-driven bet, reviewed by at least one peer or board member?

Exercise

Write Your One-Page Business Model Memo

Your 15-minute task
  1. Assemble your past work: completed offer inventory, commodity vs. premium map, premium value signals.
  2. In a fresh doc, use the template to fill in only the specifics for your company:
  • State the AI shift and client/market evidence.
  • Name your one big bet and the strategic offers that move (premium or commodity).
  • Write 1–2 sentences on what you'll double down on, sunset, or reprice.
  • List the first 2–3 leading indicators that will tell you if the bet is working.
  1. Limit yourself to one page (400 words). Use your company's real numbers, quotes, or evidence wherever possible.
  2. Share with a co-founder, board member, or trusted peer. Ask for one honest note: what feels specific and committed, what feels vague or half-sure.
  3. Revise once, tightening for clarity. Mark as draft/live for board, exec, or team review.
Output: A sharp, specific, one-page memo that sets your AI-framed business model for the next 12–24 months.

Use this at work tomorrow

List all your current offers on a page. Mark which are now undifferentiated because of AI, which still command trust or judgement, and write a memo to share with your leadership team.

05

Monitor, Measure, and Adjust

Track live signals to know—fast—if your premium bet is working, slipping, or needs a pivot. Use a real, focused dashboard to see if your premium offers are holding up as AI competitors move in, and make your decision cycle faster than the market.

A serious, well-lit editorial desk holds a simple, analog dashboard: rows of blank indicator dials, minimal levers, movable marker tokens—each corresponding to a hidden metric. Indicators are set in a warm acrylic or wood panel, with orange highlight tokens standing out. Nothing digital, no text or numbers, and no human operators present—just objects poised for active review.
Tracking what matters—premium signals vs. commodity drift—requires a real, focused dashboard ready for action, visible to all.

Why this matters in the workflow

A memo is not a bet if you never check the scoreboard. Too many leaders rewrite the business model, then rely on quarterly financials—always lagging, always too slow. As AI eats through the routine, your advantage is speed: to see, decide, and adapt before the old signals go cold. A live dashboard forces clarity. If your premium bets fade, you catch it fast. If something new starts to pop, you double down before competitors notice.

The working model You need a simple, visible system.

  • Signals, not noise. Don’t drown in metrics: pick the few that tell you the health of your premium business vs. your AI-commodity business.
  • Human-first warning lights. Look for drops in buyer trust, renewal rates, pricing power—not just revenue or traffic.
  • Actionable cadence. This isn’t window dressing. Someone needs to see the dashboard each week, name shifts, and trigger a review.

How to apply it

  1. Start with four signal types:
  • Premium activity volume: How many clients choose premium vs. basic offers, month on month?
  • Premium price realization: Are you achieving the price or are discounts creeping in?
  • Client retention/renewal: Especially in the premium zones—are they coming back?
  • AI-competition pressure: Any new entrants, price drops, lost deals traceable to automated/AI firms?
  1. Assign each to a clear metric (see template). Define what qualifies as a signal (“renewal falls 10%” or “lose two deals to AI competitor in a month”).
  2. Build the dashboard where your team actually lives (slack update, airtable, simple sheet—no fancy BI tools needed yet).
  3. Make the signals visible and tie them to decisions. Who acts if a trigger flips? What’s your reflex review process?

Quality checklist

Each signal maps to a single, easily tracked metric.

Thresholds/triggers are clear, actionable, and relevant.

At least one premium-focused metric is included.

Owner and action plan are assigned per signal.

Dashboard is in a team-visible space, not a private doc.

Update cycle (weekly/monthly) is stated.

At least one metric updated live before review.

Common mistakes

Mapping too many vague or overlapping metrics—focus is lost.

Choosing only lagging financial KPIs—miss early signals.

Setting thresholds so wide they never trigger action.

No assigned owner—dashboard goes stale.

Dashboard not visible or not updated (out of sight, out of mind).

Checkpoint

Are your premium and AI-commodity signals tracked, visible, and acted upon—fast enough to catch shifts before financial results land?

Exercise

Build Your Early Warning Dashboard Now

Goal: Set up a live dashboard that tracks your core premium and AI-commodity activity, with alert signals to trigger a review.

Steps (15 minutes):

  1. Open a blank document or your team's main shared workspace (a sheet, Notion, Airtable, Monday—anyone can see it).
  2. Using the template below, list each signal type and choose ONE clear metric for each:
  • Premium activity volume
  • Premium price realization
  • Client retention/renewal (premium)
  • AI-competition signal
  1. For each, set a concrete threshold—what would force you to review, act, or pivot?
  2. Write a short plan: who gets notified, and what meeting or process springs into motion if a trigger is hit?
  3. Share with your team or board. Invite input; revise thresholds if needed. Record who is responsible for maintaining/updating.

Use this at work tomorrow

Draft your dashboard, put in live first values, and agree with your team how you'll act when an early warning triggers.

30-day path

Days 1-3: Complete offer inventory and run an AI-impact screen on each.

Days 4-6: Complete and discuss the commodity vs. premium map with top team or board.

Days 7-10: Surface market/client proof-points for premium value. Fill in the Premium Potential Worksheet.

Days 11-15: Write, then peer-review, the business model memo. Revise.

Days 16-21: Set up the early warning dashboard. Socialize dashboard signals with team.

Days 22-30: Schedule a leadership discussion to revisit dashboard signals and reconfirm (or adjust) the strategic bet.

Success signals

Depth and honesty of the mapped offers—nothing left vague or unexamined.

Clarity of the commodity vs. premium map, with thoughtful rationales.

Quality and specificity of the final business model memo: sharp, clear, actionable.

Early uptake: team adoption, board engagement, or realigned go-to-market actions.

Dashboard in live use within 30 days, showing tracked signals for premium and commodity activities.

Reflection prompts

Where does this topic show up in real work?

What behavior should change first?

What evidence would prove this Riseplan worked?

Manager checklist

Choose one owner for the behavior change.

Use the exercise on live work.

Review the output before scaling the habit.

Decide what changes after 30 days.

Want this shaped around your company?

Risey can research your company foundation first, then build a version of this path around your real workflows, customers, and culture.

Start with your company